The User Advocate

I’ve started using and fallen in love with Performancing For Firefox (PFF) for my weblogging. However…

I have found a couple XML API oddnesses that emphasize the importance of thorough testing. Otherwise known as bugs. One is particularly nasty since it causes failure-with-no-warning, the worst possible software misstep. Both errors are encapsulation problems, based on characters that were not anticipated or cleansed before using them in the log-post process.

The first is that one of my web logs has an apostrophe in the title, which makes the code believe a string has ended prematurely. It lists the issue as a javascript error in my debugger but does not (apparently) fail to do anything I expect… but the question I have is what should it be doing that it is not?

The second, more insidious, issue comes from one of my categories. The error reads:

unexpected end of XML entity (line 1)


When you try and submit a post, it just does nothing. No feedback, no error.  Turns out it is caused by my category ‘Tips & Tricks’ which has an ampersand… and XML thinks it is the start of an entity. Now keep in mind that these categories are pulled from the weblog by PFF automatically, and you have no way of editing them. Now, PFF can’t handle the information that it created when you are posting. Bad bad bad.

The obvious ways to fix this are to

• escape the strings before using them
• or show the user a different string than the application utilizes

In either case, the ’sanitize all input’ rule applies… but the most important rule in a software developer’s toolkit – fail loudly – was ignored. If you’re not preserving the data you’ve been given (in this example by not posting it to the log) or at least yelling that you failed, you’re a problem. The user may close the browser and poof – instant data loss.

So a few posts ago I tried to help Outlook avoid bad behavior and data destruction, and in return it gave me another bad error message. Here you see an empty folder, with a dire warning about all items in it being on the brink of destruction:

It’s enough to make you cry. If there’s nothing in the folder, don’t talk about there being items and subfolders!

Far too few actually can explain coherently the reasons they like or dislike a piece of software, but here’s a great Gmail-vs-Pine analysis on snarfed.org with details and recommendations for fixes.  I currently use Eudora at home and Outlook at work (no that’s not by choice, though the calendaring is really pretty handy), and I can tell you that there are elements he mentions that I would love to see in all email programs.  Specifically, filtering is never detailed enough with condition combinations, and I really want to be able to bounce emails.

It’s great to see someone else actually thinking about user interaction instead of just saying something stinks…

I wanted to print a document, and the application (Firefox) remembered that last time I printed to PDF.  It kindly set that as my default for the next print, which I enjoy most of the time, but I wanted my default printer.  Since it’s a networked printer, it is an ugly corporate-conrolled name and I can’t rename it or type the first letter… so I [unthinkingly] pressed the HOME key.

It worked.

Now that is the way applications should work – just behave correctly so unthinking keystrokes work.  It seems like a small thing but it makes the user so much more efficient.

I’m on an email archive-and-purge mission in Outlook right now, and I found a few foibles that shouldn’t be there.  Bad user interface and data destruction waiting to happen… it must be Outlook!

I first tried to move folders with drag-and-drop into my Archive Folders that AutoArchive had created, and it kind of worked.  The folders moved but when I went to look for them, there were two!  FolderName and FolderName1 – all of a sudden I thought I was in a Dr. Seuss book.  No warning popup about a name conflict, no automatic merge, no query as to how I wanted it handled, no alert that tells me the folder has to be renamed to be moved… just a rename-and-don’t-warn-the-user evil change.  How to remediate?  Pick any of the options – but do not ever change things without alerting the user!

Second mistake, with far more critical ramifications.  Since I couldn’t move folders painlessly, I emptied their contents into the existing folders in the archive.  Then, I deleted the folders. One harmless workaround later, I was in business… until the next day.

Like any good power user, I’ve created email rules to sort incoming reports. Some went to folders I wasn’t going to use any more and had deleted, so when I adjusted my rules the affected rules were highlighted in red for me to fix.  Great!  It’s not as nice as Eudora asking how to fix the rule automatically but it is a fine way to deal with the issue. So I thought all the rules were fixed – but I was wrong.

Unbeknownst to me, the only rules highlighted were folders I had moved… the deleted folders were still considered valid targets for rules.  The next morning, reports started coming in and were distributed to the appropriate folders… already in the trash.  With no warning. One “Empty Deleted Items” from catastrophe.  However, I’m paranoid, so I went looking in the folders before permanently deleting them today – and I found emails!

Microsoft, that’s sloppy.  You want to leave folders within Deleted Items as valid rule targets, fine… I understand that some people might want that.  However, rules that point to non-deleted folders should never be automatically converted to rules pointing to something ready to be deleted. Moving a folder with rules on it into Deleted Items should be fundamentally different than moving it into a different folder.  Some options to fix:

1. Alert the user the rules now point into the trash.
2. Prompt the user to change the rule, even if it is to point to the folder in the trash.
3. Automatically break the rule as if the folder had been permanently deleted.
4. Prevent the folder move until all rules are cleared.

I personally prefer #2, but anything is preferable to the current behavior.

So I’m enjoying LinkedIn and it is a great way to keep in touch with some of the folks I have been in infrequent contact with. However, there’s one small niggle when inviting people… you can’t choose the source email address. I loved it when they added additonal emails, since it made my account management easier. It just wasn’t thought through all the way. Some people will have a whitelist on or know about only my secondary (business) email address but not on my home (primary), and I can’t get the invitation to send with the reply email I want.

The solution is easy: let users select which email to send from as part of the invitation. One more field and bingo! you’re good.

In addition, my apologies for not posting more recently. It’s been really busy and I will be catching up soon.

I recently opened an account at Bank of America, using their online application. It was slow, painful, and not a process I will do again any time soon. It couldn’t reference any of my current data with them so I had to reenter all my address and other personal information. Bad customer service, even if there are good security reasons for some obstacles.

The cherry on top of my grousing sundae came at the end of the transaction. I wanted to transfer in the money to open the account from an external bank, and I wanted to put in enough money to avoid bank fees. Easy enough, put 1000 into the first box and 300 in the second, then routing number over here and bingo!

An error message. Not the error you’d expect, though…

Fund Your Accounts

Error
There was a problem processing your request.
Some fields may have been left blank or incorrectly filled in. Please review the form to ensure that all fields are properly completed.
# The initial deposit for Standard Checking must be between 100 and 100.
# The initial deposit for Regular Savings must be between 100 and 100.

Ummm… you’re kidding, right? I can only fill in 100 for my initial deposit, not more and not less? OK, not less I understand, but you really don’t want more of my money at your bank? Isn’t that the point of the promotion that brought me to your site?

Worse, there was no such issue when I chose another initial payment method. It’s apparently a niche issue and is really bad service, as well as a QA oversight.

The punchline came when I walked into the branch to deliver my opening balance check. The account rep visibly winced as I told her a small portion of the story, and said I should come into the branch next time so they could save me time and headache. She said the system wasn’t that good.

Boy, and I thought my PR department had issues.

So my laptop OS has crashed a number of times in its brief lifetime, and each time I have let the recovery program send the data back to Microsoft. Usually, this is no big deal, and I’m happy to be a good beta tester – even though I’m using Windows XP Pro, a product that shouldn’t be this buggy after service packing. However, I had an episode that shows that the user experience guys didn’t look very hard at the crash analysis/data gathering program.

I was riding BART and my machine died. I was heading through the usual screens (why does this first one default to Don’t Send? How many users will just press Enter and not care which option is used? As a software guy, at least try and increase the odds of submission…)

Since I wasn’t online, I got the Connect First screen. No problem, I’ll send it when I get home. (again, Cancel is default?)

I’ll just sleep the computer until I’m done with my evening event and get to an internet line……

Nope.

So I have to leave my computer powered on in the car for hours, hoping the battery holds out, because I’m too stubborn to not report the error. Why should I have this problem? I’m pretty sure the first window lets me Standby when it is active, but if I agree to report then I am in one of those little-used-lightly-tested scenarios that should never have to happen. Really, you should never even get the second screen.

How to fix this? Easy… take a page from Mozilla or Apple. They’ve had crash reporting for quite a while that summarizes the data and queues it in the background, and I’ve never had an issue with it sending later. Nothing should be so critical to communicate in this application that it can’t wait until I connect to a network.

A couple days ago, the Contra Costa Times wrote a front-page article about BART providing more information about the train arrival times in many different formats – pager, email, web, phone, telepathy, etc. – and how excited riders were to get the information. One was quoted: ‘”I had to park way far away today and I had no idea when the next train was coming,” Munzell said. “If I heard something that said seven minutes, I would not have had to jog here.”‘

He’s right, but it’s the wrong problem. Look at the BART director’s quote, and tell me what’s being overlooked here…

“It’ll reduce the time you have to wait for transit or allow you to just keep doing what you’re doing for longer instead of rushing to wait on a platform for the next train or bus,” said BART board Director Bob Franklin of Berkeley. “I think it will make transit overall more convenient.”

Errr… no, it won’t. You’ll just know how long the wait is.

So another rider: “A lot of times you get here and your train is just leaving. It’s kind of frustrating.”

OK, let’s solve that problem instead. Your train just left and you missed it. What’s the best way to make you feel good?

Provide another train.

The problem with BART is the disconnect within the system’s directors and the system itself… between moving riders conveniently – their stated goal – and moving riders in bulk, which is what they keep addressing with policies to increase ridership and with goals to get cars off the road. Those are good goals and worthy of working toward, but not the ones that they tout.

So then solve the problem: run trains more frequently so when you miss a train, the next one is right behind it. This is the same theory as the London Underground uses in the heart of the city, and when I commuted on that I never cared if I missed a train. There was always another one 2-5 minutes away. BART should run every 5 minutes.

To do this, budget will always come up. The right answer is to then cut routes, always synchronize transfers, and only run two sets of trains – Concord to Daly City and Richmond to Dublin/Fremont. All stops are covered by those two routes and if you are going between routes, you transfer.

“Wait!” you say, “I was going Fremont-SF and now I have to wait longer! Not fair!”

Not so. You arrive just after work, at 5:07pm. You’ve missed the train and have to wait 14 minutes to catch the 5:21 train. If they ran every 5 minutes, you would have an equivalent turnaround with a transfer at 12th Street. The same travel time of 45 minutes, either way.

It also makes all people going on one route 5-10 minutes faster, and everyone who needs to transfer today go more quickly. Everyone wins, riders get happier, and BART gets more riders because the service is more reliable. More riders, and maybe they can add that direct route for commute hours.

Now that’s a solution BART should consider.

I live near the Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) station and take it to work many days each week. I appreciate their system and how economical the ride is, but their customer service needs work.

I’m not even talking about the people – they’re quite nice, though thinly spread. I’m talking about the systems that support the riders. Here are four examples of problems, with a possible solution that addresses them all:

1. Fare machines – they aren’t always working, and when a number of people arrive simultaneously there are never enough. This includes the few ‘Addfare’ machines, which are always needed the most right when a train arrives at the station in order to get out of the station. The congestion as people race for them is a problem.
2. Discounted tickets – they’re sold at remote vendors for a small (5%?) discount off the face value. The key issue is remote vendors. For people who depend on mass transit and travel the system daily, it is an unnecessary burden to go to some other place to get tickets. Especially when vendors run out and you can’t buy it on your schedule. I know, they don’t want to sell too many or it cuts into revenue – but you’re hurting the very people you’re trying to bring intothe system. How does this increase ridership?
3. Ticket gates – they are slow and tickets misfeed, especially the thicker discounted tickets. I’m sure it is thicker to make it survive the additional trips since they are higher values, but it doesn’t make them easier to feed into the machine.
4. Tiny tickets – you always end up a ticket with less than a ride’s worth and have to figure out how to dispose of the balance. There are donation programs for these tickets, but BART steadfastly refuses to accept more than one ticket and add them together for a ride. Again, I’m pretty sure they are counting on people throwing them away and/or ignoring them so BART gets to keep the revenue for no effort. They only make two places available for combining the tiny tickets, so one has to travel quite a ways to get them combined.

So what’s the answer? Fastrak for people. Get some tiny RFID dongles like Mobil Speedpass and give each frequent rider an account.

• Riding becomes easier (more riders=more revenue!)
• No congestion at the fare machines (happier riders!)
• Fewer moving parts (less machine breakage!)
• Prepaid accounts (BART keeps the interest!)
• Automatic account replenishment (no tickets to manage or purchase in weird locations!)
• Discounts for frequent riders (Maybe escalating as you spend more each month? Or have a per-month $2 minimum for the account to make up for the missing tiny tickets?)